Abstract

The global network of protected areas (PAs) is systematically biased towards remote and unproductive places. Consequently, the processes threatening biodiversity are not halted and conservation impact—defined as the beneficial environmental outcomes arising from protection relative to the counterfactual of no intervention—is smaller than previously thought. Yet, many conservation plans still target species’ representation, which can fail to lead to impact by not considering the threats they face, such as land conversion and climate change. Here we aimed to identify spatial conservation priorities that minimize the risk of land conversion, while retaining sites with high value for threatened plants at risk from climate change in the Brazilian Cerrado. We compared a method of sequential implementation of conservation actions to a static strategy applied at one time-step. For both schedules of conservation actions, we applied two methods for setting priorities: (i) minimizing expected habitat conversion and prioritizing valuable sites for threatened plants (therefore maximizing conservation impact), and (ii) prioritizing sites based only on their value for threatened plants, regardless of their vulnerability to land conversion (therefore maximizing representation). We found that scenarios aimed at maximizing conservation impact reduced total vegetation loss, while still covering large proportions of species’ ranges inside PAs and priority sites. Given that planning to avoid vegetation loss provided these benefits, vegetation information could represent a reliable surrogate for overall biodiversity. Besides allowing for the achievement of two distinct goals (representation and impact), the impact strategies also present great potential for implementation, especially under current conservation policies.

中文翻译：

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评估在气候变化下，巴西塞拉多未来行动在最大程度上减少土地转换带来的植被损失的影响

摘要

全球保护区网络系统地偏向偏远和无产的地方。因此，威胁生物多样性的过程不会停止，而且保护影响（定义为相对于没有干预的反事实而言，保护带来的有益环境成果）要比以前想象的要小。但是，许多保护计划仍然以物种的代表性为目标，如果不考虑其面临的威胁（例如土地转换和气候变化），就无法导致影响。在这里，我们旨在确定将土地转换的风险降到最低的空间保护重点，同时保留巴西Cerrado面临气候变化威胁的濒危植物的高价值遗址。我们将一种顺序执行保护措施的方法与一次应用的静态策略进行了比较。对于这两个保护行动计划，我们采用了两种方法来确定优先级：（i）最小化预期的栖息地转换并优先考虑濒危植物的有价值地点（从而最大程度地保护环境），以及（ii）仅根据受威胁植物的价值来优先考虑地点，而不考虑其对土地转换的脆弱性（因此代表权最大化）。我们发现，旨在最大程度地发挥保护作用的方案减少了总的植被损失，同时仍然涵盖了保护区和优先地点内物种范围的很大一部分。鉴于避免植被损失的计划提供了这些好处，植被信息可以代表整体生物多样性的可靠替代。除了实现两个截然不同的目标（代表和影响）外，影响战略还具有很大的实施潜力，尤其是在当前的保护政策下。